Daily Archives: July 3, 2017

Feminism

Deborah Sampson

July 3, 1782: Deborah Sampson wounded outside Tarrytown, NY receiving two musket balls in her thigh and a forehead wound from a sabre slash. She begged her fellow soldiers to let her die and not take her to the hospital, but they refused to abandon her. Doctors treated her head wound, but she left the hospital before they could attend to the musket balls. Fearful that her true identity would be discovered, she removed one of the balls herself with a penknife and sewing needle, but her leg never fully healed because the other musket ball was too deep for her to reach. (see Deborah for expanded story)

Brian Jones

July 3 – 6, 1969: the festival’s 1969 program was an experiment in fusing jazz, soul and rock music and audiences. Its lineup included, besides jazz, Friday evening appearances by rock groups Jeff Beck, Blood, Sweat & Tears, Ten Years After, and Jethro Tull. Saturday’s schedule mixed jazz acts such as Miles Davis and Dave Brubeck with others including John Mayall and Sly & the Family Stone. James Brown was among those who appeared Sunday afternoon, followed in the evening by Johnny Winter, Herbie Hancock, B. B. King, and Led Zeppelin.

Jim Morrison

July 3, 1971: Jim Morrison died.

July 3 Peace Love Art Activism

Vietnam & Operation Popeye

July 3, 1972: a NY Times article on Operation Popeye appeared. It’s lead paragraph stated that “The United States has been secretly seeding clouds over North Vietnam, Laos and South Vietnam to increase and control the rainfall for military purposes.”

A second NYT article quoted Dr. Matthew Meseison, a professor of biology at Harvard University, from the June 16 issue of the magazine Science:

“It is obvious that weather modification used as a weapon of war has the potential for causing large‐scale and quite possibly uncontrollable and unpredictable destruction. Furthermore, such destruction might well have a far greater impact on civilians than on combatants. This would be especially true in areas where subsistence agriculture is practiced, in food‐deficit areas, and in areas subject to flooding.”

A third NYT article stated: Two former high‐ranking officials of the Johnson Administration said…that Robert S. McNamara, while Secretary of Defense, specifically ordered the Air Force to stop all rainmaking late in 1967….But other officials, who served in both the Johnson and Nixon Administrations, said they recalled no such clear‐cut order.It was not clear whether Mr. McNamara’s order was dis obeyed, ignored, or—as one of ficial suggested—“there was a kind of slippage” in putting it into effect. (see Operation Popeye for expanded story)

July 3 Peace Love Art Activism

FREE SPEECH

July 3, 1978: comedian George Carlin had developed a routine that used a host of dirty words, to great comic effect. At one point the monologue was broadcast on WBAI, a nonprofit radio station in New York City. A listener complained and the FCC issued WBAI a citation for broadcasting obscene material. The Pacifica Foundation, which owned WBAI, took an appeal to the Supreme Court.

In FCC v Pacifica Foundation, decided on this day, the Court upheld the FCC in a 5–4 vote, singling out the seven words, The seven words are: shit, piss, cunt, fuck, tits, cocksucker, and motherfucker. You can find the words in the Supreme Court’s opinion, but you just can’t hear them on the radio (or network television).

In the decision it was written: “As Mr. Justice Sutherland wrote, a ‘nuisance may be merely a right thing in the wrong place, like a pig in the parlor instead of the barnyard’ . . . We simply hold that when the Commission [the FCC] finds that a pig has entered the parlor, the exercise of its regulatory power does not depend on proof that the pig is obscene.” (see July 9)

July 3 Peace Love Art Activism

Toxteth & Merseyside revolts

July 3, 1981: the Merseyside police force had a poor reputation within the black community for stopping and searching young black men in the area, under the “sus” laws, and the perceived heavy-handed arrest of Leroy Alphonse Cooper watched by an angry crowd, led to a disturbance in which three policemen were injured. [Echo story] (see July 9)

July 3 Peace Love Art Activism

TERRORISM

July 3, 1988: U.S. missiles shot down Iran Air Flight 655, a civilian jet airliner over the Strait of Hormuz. All 290 passengers and crew aboard died. [Washington Post story] (see Dec 21)

July 3 Peace Love Art Activism

Iraq War II

July 3, 2006: Pfc. Steven Green charged with the rape and murder of a young Iraqi girl. (see July 8)

July 3 Peace Love Art Activism

STAND YOUR GROUND LAW

July 3, 2017: Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Milton Hirsch found Florida’s recently updated “stand your ground” law to be unconstitutional, rolling back a defendant-friendly change to an already defendant-friendly law.

The new version of the statute made it easier for defendants to claim self-defense in shootings and potentially have the case against them thrown out. Under the revised law, prosecutors had the burden to prove that defendants who claim they shot in self-defense were wrong, rather than defendants having to prove they’re right.

If a defendant acted in self-defense, the judge could dismiss related criminal charges. The National Rifle Association played a major hand in pushing through the new legislation.

Hirsch held that under the state’s constitution, this change to the law could be made only by the Florida Supreme Court and not by the legislature. [M H article] (see Aug 11)

July 3 Peace Love Art Activism

Environmental Issues

July 3, 2017: a U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit panel rebuffed Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt’s contention that stakeholders didn’t have a chance to object before the Obama administration in August set in motion requirements that energy companies monitor and reduce emissions of planet-warming methane. Pruitt in May announced a 90-day delay of the regulation, part of a widespread Obama administration effort to curb methane.

“The administrative record thus makes clear that industry groups had ample opportunity to comment on all four issues on which EPA granted reconsideration, and indeed, that in several instances the agency incorporated those comments directly into the final rule,” two of the three appeals judges wrote in the split opinion.

“Because it was thus not ‘impracticable’ for industry groups to have raised such objections during the notice and comment period [the Clean Air Act] did not require reconsideration and did not authorize the stay.”

July 3 Music et al

Brian Jones

July 3 – 6, 1969: the festival’s 1969 program was an experiment in fusing jazz, soul and rock music and audiences. Its lineup included, besides jazz, Friday evening appearances by rock groups Jeff Beck, Blood, Sweat & Tears, Ten Years After, and Jethro Tull. Saturday’s schedule mixed jazz acts such as Miles Davis and Dave Brubeck with others including John Mayall and Sly & the Family Stone. James Brown was among those who appeared Sunday afternoon, followed in the evening by Johnny Winter, Herbie Hancock, B. B. King, and Led Zeppelin.

July 3 Music et al

Jim Morrison

“Jim Morrison, a man who sang, wrote and drank hard as lead singer of the Doors, has died – peacefully – at the age of 27. Morrison’s death, despite (and because of) strategic efforts on the part of his wife Pamela and friends, was shrouded in mystery.

He died in the early morning of Saturday, July 3rd, but it was July 9th, two days after he had been buried in a Paris cemetery, before his manager let word out to the American press.”